


Intervention

by orphan_account



Series: Marginalia [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-07
Updated: 2016-02-07
Packaged: 2018-05-18 16:37:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5935351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What is it with Skywalker men and dark lords, anyway?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Intervention

Being one with the Force is interesting, to say the least. You don’t always know where you end and someone else begins and other people’s thoughts are always humming at the back of your mind. Padmé has been a queen and a senator both, so the feeling of being _more_ than the sum of one’s parts isn’t exactly new. She even likes it.

 

But then there’s Ben. Brilliant, angry, _idiotic_ Ben, who broke all of their hearts. Anakin lies up long nights in the netherworld, talking into the dark.

 

“Do you think if…” His hands trace patterns in the air. He is nineteen and twenty-two and forty-six, all at once, but the haunted look in his eyes stays the same. “If I’d been there–”

 

“No, Ani,” Padmé says, rolling over in their bed and pressing a finger to his lips. “We can’t think that way. Whatever _would_ have happened, it _didn’t_ , and all the wishing in the world won’t change that.”

 

He sighs. “But if I’d told Obi-Wan about my dreams–”

 

“ _No_ , Ani.”

 

Things get worse. Padmé can’t manifest in the material world, but she knows that Leia is grieving and Han is gone. Her bright, earnest boy packs up his bags and leaves for a distant planet, as if running away is going to fix anything.

 

“It’s completely irresponsible!” she says, to a sympathetic Riyo Chuchi. “If he’d only turn and face the problem, then–”

 

Riyo lays a gentle hand over Padmé’s own.

 

“Go easy on yourself,” she says.

 

“I was _talking_ about Luke.”

 

Riyo smiles sadly. “Are you sure?”

 

She’s right. Of course she’s right. Riyo’s hard-earned gravitas and wisdom are at once the best and worst things about her. Padmé changes the subject and the two of them spend the rest of their visit wandering around Riyo’s traditional Pantoran garden, discussing the ethical implications of memory-wiping droids.

 

But the worries come flooding back afterwards, and Padmé doesn’t know what to do. She fumes her way through Rylothian meadows and wades across Alderaanian streams; she hunts down Revan and Obi-Wan Kenobi and Shaak Ti and grills them about Jedi philosophy through the ages; she combs through the archives of a thousand star systems, and still comes up with no solution to the problem of Ben Organa.

 

That’s fine. Padmé is always at her best when the traditional guidelines no longer apply.

 

She is not able to manifest in the physical world, but she’s been visiting Leia’s dreams since her daughter was a little girl. Ben’s mind is a jumble of ultraviolet emotion and open doors, and for a practiced snoop like Padmé it’s almost too easy. She picks a night when he’s far away from Snoke, and walks right into his latest dream.

 

The room looks like her grandmother Naberrie’s house. Chairs are stacked on top of each other beside a scarred wardrobe. There’s a slashed-up portrait of Leia in the corner, and on the battered table next to the window a dejarik board flickers feebly in and out of existence. Ben sits on a shipping crate. His dark hair hangs lank and greasy around his face.

 

And he’s not alone. There is a creature kneeling beside her grandson, speaking to him in low, earnest tones. Its pale hand rests on Ben’s cheek. The boy is shivering, eyes big in his thin face, gazing at the creature as if it holds all the answers in the universe. And…

 

…it bears a passing resemblance to Anakin, provided you were unfamiliar with Anakin’s humor and warmth. If, say, you’ve never met the man.

 

A broom presents itself. Padmé brandishes it.

 

“Get out,” she says.

 

Supreme Leader Snoke looks up.

 

“Senator Amidala,” he says. “What an unexpected pleasure.”

 

“Oh, no,” Padmé says, stalking forward. “The pleasure’s all mine, Supreme Leader. But I’m afraid the time has come for you to leave.”

 

She hits him over the head with the broom. Ben screams. Snoke dissolves, flows away like smoke, and re-manifests beside her.

 

“You know you can’t kill me,” he says, affably.

 

“True!” Padmé says, and pokes him in the eyes. He yelps, swipes at her. His fingers scrape against her skin like ice. She laughs. “I’m dead, Snoke. What did you think that would do?”

 

He snarls, the last vestiges of Anakin falling away, and wraps a hand around her throat.

 

“The boy is mine,” he hisses.

 

_Don’t think about Mustafar, don’t think about Mustafar, don’t–_ “No,” she says, although her voice is shaking and she wants to be sick. “H-he’s a person and his name is Ben.”

 

She’s had combat training. She knows how to throw a punch. She thinks that being suddenly laid flat on the floor is something of a surprise for Snoke, though. He’s so very used to having the upper hand.

 

But in Ben Organa’s cluttered, contradictory mind, the ability to levitate objects is irrelevant. Skill with a humming laser sword is completely useless. No, here it comes down to mere strength of will, and Padmé’s has always been considerable.

 

“Leave,” she tells Snoke. “Now.”

 

Snoke scrambles ungracefully to his feet and throws himself at her. She’s dead; has been dead for years now, and is under no obligation to be solid. He tumbles through her and out the other side, hitting the wall with a nasty crunch.

 

“Who are you?” Ben says. His eyes are glassy but he _looks_ at her. Padmé almost weeps with relief.

 

“Someone who loves you,” she says, reaching out for him. Behind her comes the sound of Snoke peeling himself off the floor again. She sighs, withdraws her hand, and turns around to face him.

 

Snoke is a rattletrap creature of old bone and water lain stagnant for years. Cobwebs flutter in the air around him. He bares his teeth at her.

 

“Impressive, Senator,” he says.

 

Ah, the condescension of old men. The one thing she _doesn’t_ miss from her days in the Senate.

 

“Thank you,” she says. “But I wasn’t waiting for your approval.” She’s thinking fast now. There must be a door, if only in the most metaphorical sense. There must be a door, because Snoke was not born in the neural pathways of Ben Organa’s head. He must have entered _somewhere_.

 

She closes her eyes and wills it to appear.

 

“What are you doing?” Snoke says. He sounds curious and a little amused. He sounds very Palpatine, actually. Padmé is concentrating too hard to hate him for it.

 

The dream-world adjusts slightly, and Padmé’s eyes fly open. Sure enough, there is a narrow door directly behind Snoke. Thank you very much, Ben Organa’s subconscious.

 

“It’s been a long evening,” she says, mock-graciously. “Please, Supreme Leader, _why don’t I show you out_.”

 

Snoke’s eyes barely have time to widen before she’s flying at him, swinging her broom like a bristly staff, and the door is flying open of its own accord, Padmé’s momentum pushing him through in a tangle of spindly legs and threadbare robes. There’s an enraged scream, a blinding flash of light, and then she finds the doorknob and pushes it with all her might. The lock clicks. The door dissolves. She stands there in the dusty room, catching her breath.

 

“You sent Grandfather away,” Ben says, sounding much younger than his sixteen years.

 

“That _thing_ ,” Padmé snarls, thoroughly fed up with Force-sensitives in general and Skywalker men in particular, “was _not your grandfather_.”

 

“He’ll be back.” Ben’s eyes are glittering feverishly, his hands clenched at his sides. “You’re _nothing_ against the power of the Dark! He’ll be _back_!”

 

“Yes,” Padmé says, smiling at him. He's a foolish, talented boy, burning with ill-placed resentment. She knows the type. “And so will I.”

 

 

 


End file.
